ARTICLE AND PHOTOGRAPHS BY MATTIAS KLUM
Most people think of lions as strictly African
beasts, but only because they've been killed
off almost everywhere else. Ten thousand
years ago lions spanned vast sections of the
globe, and so did people, who-as they multi
plied and organized-put pressure on competi
tors at the top of the food chain. Now lions hold
only a small fraction of their former habitat, and Asiatic lions, a sub
species that split from African lions perhaps 100,000 years ago, hang
on to an almost impossibly small slice of their former domain.
India is the proud steward of these 300 or so lions, which live pri
marily in a 560-square-mile sanctuary. It took me a year and a half to
get a permit to explore the entire Gir Forest-and no time at all to
see why these lions became symbols of royalty and greatness. A tiger
will slink through the forest unseen, but a lion stands its ground,
curious and unafraid-lionhearted. Though they told me in subtle
ways when I got too close, Gir's lions allowed me unique glimpses
into their lives during my three months in the forest. It's odd to think
that they are threatened by extinction; Gir has as many lions as it can
hold-too many, in fact. With territory in short supply, lions prowl
the periphery of the forest and even leave it altogether, often clashing
with people. That's one reason India is creating a second sanctuary.
There are other pressing reasons: outbreaks of disease or natural
disasters. In 1994 canine distemper killed more than a third of Afri
ca's Serengeti lions-a thousand animals-a fate that could easily
befall Gir's cats. These lions, saved by a prince at the turn of the 20th
century, are especially vulnerable to disease because they descend
from as few as a dozen individuals. "If you do a DNA fingerprint,
Asiatic lions actually look like identical twins," says Stephen O'Brien,
a geneticist who has studied them. Yet the perils are hidden, and you
wouldn't suspect them by watching these lords of the forest. The
lions exude vitality, and no small measure of charm.
A mother and cub
safely ensconced in
the forest have no
idea of the tenuous
ness of their birth
right. Greece saw its
last lion shortly after
the birth of Christ
about five centuries
after it minted this
coin (left). The Asiatic
lion's range shrank
steadily until the 19th
century, when guns
all but wiped out the
population.
ROYALCOINCABINET,
STOCKHOLM,SWEDEN(LEFT)
How close is too close when
lions are mating? Mattias
Klum answers this and other
questions in a video inter
view at nationalgeographic
.com/ngm/0106.